The Babymaker Ch. 05

"Where do I sign?" ask Roseblatt. Miriam drew up the papers and all parties signed them.

"I gotta admit, Commander Troy." Roseblatt said when we were done, and I was getting up to leave. "I didn't think any cop could touch me. And I have friends that won't like it that you did."

"Your friends are dirty nasty Legs." I replied. "At least your Airborne wings will keep you warm at night while you're sitting in your nine-by-six cell in Jacksonville. The other bozos?" I whimpered a laugh, then said "I pity the fools, I truly do..."

* * * * * * * * * * * * * *

7:30pm, Monday, October 5th. Being Monday night, there were not a lot of people at the Cop Bar. So we had no problem securing the main back room for a small celebration.

And it did not take long after having beer and snacks before Cindy Ross tapped her spoon to her glass. "I really want to hear this one. So start talking, Iron Crowbar." Everyone stopped and gave me a large round of applause. The few Police Officers in the main front room brought chairs in; they wanted to hear this, too.

"Okay, then." I said, as I sat down and it got quiet. "This was a Team effort, and the work of you Detectives, all you Officers, and people helping us got us to this satisfactory conclusion. And I'm confident that you guys would've found the solution without me."

People were shaking their heads vigorously in disagreement, so I said "Oh yes, I believe you would have. I just sped up the process. So! let's look at the case. My first observation was the Carl Ryder murder scene. He had over a thousand dollars in his wallet, but it wasn't taken. That led to two questions: why wasn't that money taken, and where did the money come from? In hindsight, we already had our first clue to the Babymaker ring."

Me: "Then something very interesting happened, something that wasn't apparent: someone had said that Carl Ryder had a pulse, and so he was removed from the vehicle and transported to the Hospital. What wasn't known at the time was that Carl was shot twice, and the second shot took out his autonomous systems; I had that from a doctor in the E.R. at the time. Carl was dead in the car."

Me: "So why say he was alive? At first I thought it was like JFK being pronounced dead thirty minutes after he was obviously killed when that head shot blew out his brains, so that a priest could give him the Last Rites But then I realized it was to get his wife Wanda to the Hospital, so that the perps would have time to ransack his house."

Me: "Next was the hospital. Wanda's partner Ariel was more than aggressive in protecting Wanda, and got arrested for it, which was not Ariel's norm. And Wanda began dodging answering certain questions. So that, and the money in Carl's wallet at the time of his death, then the break-in at his home all showed me a possible motive for the murder, but we needed more data to determine exactly what that was."

Me: "And that data came quickly. Our excellent CSIs found the gym bag in Carl's car and the computer inside it. The bag was actually created as a spy device, and the computer recorded what was videoed. In this case, the video was of Carl having sex with a lovely married woman. And my imagination began working to tell me that that sexual liaison could've been related to the $1000."

Me: "Facial rec got us the information on who the woman and her husband were, and we interviewed them. They wouldn't admit to paying Carl money, but they did admit that the sexual coupling was for the purpose of making a baby. So now we had a strong motive for the reason for Carl's death, if he had been impregnating other women, too."

Me: "It was unfortunate that I had to interview Wanda and Ariel right after the Visitation... there were a lot of painful moments in all of this... but we learned of the Babymaker ring and also got Carl's recordings of his other liaisons. And that led to the big break in the case: Carla Rose, and the man she was passing off as her husband, David Rose, née Flanders."

Me: "It was clear to me that David Rose was not the man his backstop claimed him to be. He was anything but the former Tau Fraternity brother and associate of the Establishment Elites that his record indicated him to be. Teddy Parker caught on that David was a cuckold. But he is not married to the University's sex professor, so it didn't occur to him immediately what that implied." There were some chuckles at that.

Me: "I'm sure that it would have occurred to him, or to some of you, over time. I also observed that Carla was attempting to hide a black eye, and we were not fooled by her story of running into a refrigerator door. I didn't think the David Rose we were seeing could have done that, and that's where I think my first idea of who the true criminal was came to my mind. And I was able to tell the Chief that I had hopes we'd eventually make arrests for the murders." Chief Moynahan nodded vigorously in agreement.

I went on: "So after the interview with Carla and David, we were beginning to get a really good picture of what was going on, but we still had a gap as to who the killer or killers were. And then David Rose was found dead with his hands cut off and his teeth pulled... and things began falling into place really rapidly from there."

"Rapidly?" asked Teddy Parker. "That just made it more complicated!" There were murmurs of agreement.

I said "Quite the opposite, Mr. Parker. First, we saw the attempts to conceal David's identity by removing the ability to get fingerprints and dental records. But We the Police were well ahead of the killers on that. So we got to have another 'conversation' with Carla Rose, we got to raid Rose Advertising, and it all started coming out. The Babymaker ring was out, and we were getting the names of both the men and the women in it."

"And a lot more suspects to look into, sir." Julia Rodriguez said.

"Let me interject something there." said Sheriff Griswold. "Some of you know young Timmy Austin, who is already a National Master in chess, and will soon be an International Master if I don't miss my guess. He told me something very interesting. He said that chess Masters would look at a position on the chessboard, and could remember almost everything, and sequences of moves. But chess Grandmasters were able to separate the wheat from the chaff, so to speak, and zoned in on only the most important things, and wouldn't even remember the rest of the board."

Griswold: "You all are master Detectives, you truly are. If you weren't, you wouldn't be working here. But Crowbar here is the Grandmaster. He starts seeing through all the other stuff that you guys look at... and have to, sometimes... and goes for the important stuff."

"Good analogy, Sheriff." I said, practicing good asskissing skills. "So we found out who David Rose really was, and in learning that we learned his child support legal story. The important thing about that for me was that not only was his DNA profile on record, but his wife and especially his children's DNA profiles were on record. We also learned that David Flanders and David Roseblatt knew each other, and that's when I used my imagination and considered that David Roseblatt was the biological father of the Flanders children."

There were reactions by almost everyone in the room as they realized the import of that deduction. I drove on: "I also will commend Captain Tanya Muscone. She was on another mission, but even without the full knowledge of the case, she was able to consider that Roseblatt, among others, was behind the murders, and more importantly, she had zoned in on the likely motive, which was jealousy. Jealousy is a powerful motive, and was the motive of the Original crime: Cain murdering Abel. She was on it, so if I weren't here nor involved in this, you still would be on the right path."

Me: "And this is where I may have started being able to speed things up." I said. "Once we were on the right track of who the real David Rose was, we found out that Roseblatt had been an Army Officer. And my hopes surged at that, because I knew that the military took and kept DNA profiles of all their personnel going back decades. As a lesson to you all: I have cultivated relationships with some of the right people, and in this case I had an Army General and a Marine General with the power to get me Roseblatt's DNA profile, despite his father having been a General Officer who had had his records sealed."

Me: "And once I had that, I was able to run it and confirm that Roseblatt was the biological father of the Flanders children. And knowing what we did, that Flanders had worked for Roseblatt, that Flanders was a wife-watching cuckold, and Roseblatt's nature, it really fit that Flanders had been sent by Roseblatt to spy on Carla. Roseblatt apparently was not worried about Carla and David being swingers in the Club Scene, but when he found out she was pregnant... and David having not mentioned Carla and Carl to him until he specifically asked about it... Roseblatt went berserk. He hit Carla, and then he had Carl and David murdered."

Me: "I was able to quietly get arrest warrants, and we moved on Roseblatt. He tried to run, then did something really stupid by trying to disarm a two-time Police Boxing Matches Champion, and got his face slammed into the sidewalk for it. We had the interview in I-1, and Roseblatt saw that he was going to be on the losing end of this one. So did Nathan Masterson, who protected his true masters's interests by walking out on his duties to represent his client."

"So what are your questions concerning any of this?" I asked. As always, that generated some laughter.

"How many General Officers do we know?" quipped Rudistan.

"Admittedly, I had an advantage, there." I said. "But I paid the price for knowing General McFarland." Like being cuffed to a nuclear weapon. (Author's note: 'The Nuclear Option'.)

"And you all know Admiral Cordell," I said, "so you would've had that inroad." Teresa nodded vigorously in agreement.

"Most of us here don't have seventeen military parachute jumps, either." said Julia Rodriguez. "You really dominated Roseblatt with that in the interrogation."

"And he better not get any more parachute jumps." Cindy Ross 'warned' me. "We can dominate jerks like Roseblatt without them."

"I think the Deputy Chief is jealous." I said. "But yes, Julia, that's a good observation. Roseblatt was playing the alpha-male games, as Commander Ross likes to call them. Breaking him down like that did help."

"Telling him what he did and how he did it helped more." said Tanya Muscone. "And that really is the one thing you can do that none of the rest of us really can."

"Har." barked the Sheriff. "Any of you in here could do that, as long as you have your ducks in a row and the confidence to put it all on the line like Crowbar does."

"Why does that not make me feel any better?" said Joanne Warner quietly to Theo and Teddy.

"Sir," said George Newman, "the two perps you arrested for committing the murders... they don't look smart enough to have broken into Wanda's house and ransacked it."

"Good point." I said. "I have no proof, but I'm surmising that they handed off the key to the house to someone else, and that someone else ransacked the house. And you're right about their capability to do the break-in, as I doubt Carl's killers knew enough to decode the alarm. Yes, someone else was involved, there."

"I have a question, sir." said Roark Coleman. "Was Carla Rose arrested?"

"Yes and no." I said. "We had some long conversations with the D.A. about it. Carla was not involved in either murder, not in any way we know of, much less can prove. Her only crimes were aiding and abetting a fugitive in helping David hide from the controversial child support charges, and lying to Police. Miriam Walters gave her a deal that if she testifies against Roseblatt, then her crimes will be reduced to misdemeanors, and she'll only have to pay some fines."

"What about Wanda and Ariel?" Cindy asked.

"And the guys in the Babymaker ring?" asked Teddy Parker.

I replied: "There will be no charges against Wanda nor Ariel, per the Immunity Agreement I gave them. And unless something pops concerning the Babymaker ring, we have no proof to charge those guys nor the women they impregnated with anything. And quite frankly, I would just as soon as nothing pop up. I've never been enamored with female prostitution being a crime, and I certainly don't see what these guys did wrong in helping women conceive a much desired child."

"But sir!" said an astonished Joanne Warner, "we're talking babies, here!"

"Yes, we are." I replied. "And your point is?"

I received no answer...

Part 30 - Cleanup on Aisle 5

"This is Bettina Wurtzburg, KXTC Channel Two News!" shouted the redheaded MILF reporterette at 7:00am, Tuesday, October 6th, from the KXTC studios anchor desk. "An arrest is made in the murders of Carl Ryder and David Rose!"

Following the 'hard charging' music intro, Bettina began: "The Town & County Police issued a statement announcing that David Roseblatt, Senior Partner of the Rose Advertising Firm, was arrested and charged with hiring two men to murder Carl Ryder and David Flanders, who went by the alias David Rose. Also arrested were the two men who actually committed the crimes, and a man who allegedly transferred the money between Mr. Roseblatt and the killers.

Bettina: "Sources tell Channel Two News that Commander Donald Troy solved the cases and made the arrests. Attorneys for Mr. Roseblatt are questioning why Commander Troy was not recused from the cases, as Carl Ryder was employed at Town Fitness Centers, which is owned by Commander Troy's first cousin, Commander Cindy Ross; and of course the allegations that Commander Troy's wife, Dr. Laura Fredricson, was running the male prostitution ring that was exposed during the investigation of the murders. This will certainly be a point made by Mr. Roseblatt's attorneys to get the charges against their client dropped."

Bettina: "Citizens who were investigated by Police just for being members of Town Fitness Centers filed a lawsuit against Commander Donald Troy and the TCPD after the Police ignored their lawful 'cease and desist' orders. Those lawsuits were dropped with prejudice by Judge Rodney K. Watts, who outrageously said that the Citizens had no right nor legal standing to sue, and that their cease and desist orders had no force in law. The Citizens have promised to appeal."

Bettina: "And groups of University students marched on Campus yesterday, calling for Dr. Laura Fredricson to resign as the Head of the Psychology Department and also her professorship, after credible charges of ethics violations and even criminal. activity were filed against her. The University Ethics Board will meet soon to discuss these serious, credible charges and decide what to do about Laura Fredricson, wife of TCPD Commander Donald Troy."

Bettina: "And in other news, the annual process of appearing before the Town & County Assembly to make budget presentations begins this week. Let's go to Carl Lemay with more on this important story. Carl!"

"That's right, Bettina!" said Lemay, reporting from the rooftop of the building at Riverside and College, with City Hall in the background "Sources tell Channel Two News that the Democrats on the Assembly intend to hold the Budget hostage unless and until the Assembly agrees to defund the Police. The Democrats are even threatening to leave the County if not the State, in order to deny a quorum to be in session, which would prevent a Budget from being passed by the required date of November 1st..."

* * * * * * * * * * * * * *

9:00am. It was a sad day for me. Sitting in my office was Corporal Inga Gunddottar, who had just submitted her resignation from the Town & County Police Force.

"I am sorry to be leaving, sir." Inga was saying. "But I need to go. I know people don't mean to, sir, but... I see the way they glance at me, and talk behind my back. They don't know if I'll freeze up when a dangerous situation hits, and..."

I said "You don't have to explain. I get it. They look at you as 'damaged goods' after what was done to you. They see you as a raped, violated woman, damaged goods, not a Police Officer any longer." Inga nodded, and I said: "That's tough to deal with. It's not fair, it's not right, but that doesn't make it easier for you. So, you've been hired by the New York Police Force. Are you ready to handle that?"

"Yes sir." said Inga. "They're bigger than the TCPD... but not better. I get the feeling I'll be teaching them a thing or two."

I smiled at that. "No doubt you will." I said as I stood up. "You are here until November 1st, and I'll expect you to be at Promotions and Medals Day that day. And I wish you the very best in New York. If you need anything... just let me know."

Inga also stood up. "Thank you, sir. It... it's been a very great honor working for you, sir."

"It's been my honor to work with you." I replied, extending my hand. Inga shook it, then stood up to attention and saluted me. I returned it, then Inga left the office.

As I sat back down, I contemplated. Yes, we'd all seen how other Officers had tried not to treat Inga differently, and had failed. And some jerks openly leered at her and said crude things about her behind her back, or so they thought. And Laura had warned me that this might happen. I also knew that she had broken up with Jerome Davis, which factored into her decision.

And she had not just been called out of the blue (pun not intended) by the NYPD. EAD Owen Lange had friends in the New York FBI offices, and friends in the NYPD, and he he honored my request to have them give Inga an interview. She had impressed them, and they had hired her. I was sorry to lose Corporal Gunddottar, but I knew this was for the best for two Police Departments, and for one very good and very courageous Police Officer...

* * * * * * * * * * * * * *

9:45am. Lt. Commander Teresa Croyle came into my office, having been called by Helena., and not at my request. I was sitting in my chair behind my desk, my arms on the armrests, and my chin on my chest. I was in total pain, barely aware of anything going on around me, which had caused Helena concern.

"Sir, is everything okay?" Teresa asked. I looked up, and she could see the tears in my eyes.

"No." I said. "Everything is not okay. I'm losing an Angel. Cindy has been called to the Sheriff's office in City Hall for her discipline."

"What is the Sheriff going to do?" Teresa asked, her voice sounding worried.

"I don't know." I said., my voice almost breaking. "Neither he nor the Chief told me. But I do know... she will not be the TCPD Deputy Chief any longer..."

* * * * * * * * * * * * * *

10:00am, Tuesday, October 6th. Police Deputy Chief Cindy Ross was ushered into Sheriff Griswold's office. She was wearing her Duty Dress jacket with full ribbons over a white shirt and black necktie, the metal silver stars of her rank gleaming on her shoulder epaulettes.

Chief Moynahan, also semi-formally attired, was already in the office, and took his place behind her left shoulder. Also in the room was Sheriff's Chief of Staff Oswald, sitting to one side.

"Sheriff, I submit myself for disciplinary action." Cindy said as she stood at attention in front of the Sheriff's desk.

"Stand at ease, Commander." the Sheriff said. He was wearing his dark brown jacket with ribbons, the four gold stars on each shoulder also gleaming. It was all formal for this one.

Griswold said "I like the way Commander Troy does this, so I'm going to copy his example today. I have here on my desk two folders. One of them, this black one, is poison. Rat poison. It contains your demotion to Captain, and my invitation for you to resign from the TCPD. As a well-deserving Medal of Valor recipient, you have the right to retire, and the paperwork is in there to do so, to retire... as a Captain."